Create a new timeslip

In this guide we’ll show you how to set up a new timeslip to to track time you spend working on a project for a client.

Getting started

Before you can start recording time, you need to set up a project for the work in FreeAgent. It’s a good idea to add relevant tasks to the project when you set it up, but you will also have the opportunity to add a new task each time you create a timeslip.

To access the Time Tracking feature, choose Time Tracking from the Work drop-down menu. If you are working in another part of the Work area, such as Projects, you can access Time Tracking by selecting it from the the top of the page.

You will then be presented with the Time Tracking overview screen:

Ways to track your time

There are three ways to track your time with FreeAgent:

Use a stopwatch timer

Using the stopwatch timer is an easy and accurate way to track your time with FreeAgent. When you start a new piece of work, start by choosing the date and person in the “Add New Timeslip” widget. Then, start typing to search for the relevant project or client in the project drop-down list - matching projects will automatically appear. Select your project, then type to search for the appropriate task, which will also automatically list any matching tasks. You can also create a new task from this drop-down list, and mark it as billable or unbillable. Finally, select “Start Timer.”

This automatically generates a new timeslip with a running timer. Once you have finished, press the ‘pause’ button next to the timer:

Your time is now recorded for this project.

You can use the stopwatch timers to create new timeslips and to update existing ones. If you need to, you can have stopwatch timers running for multiple projects simultaneously. These timers will continue to run if you log out of FreeAgent or close your browser, so remember to stop the timer when you finish working on each task! The stopwatch icon at the top of the page will indicate how many active timers you have running - just select on this icon to go directly to your active timers.

Create a daily timeslip

To create a timeslip for a single piece of work after you have finished it, first complete all the fields in the ‘Add new timeslip’ widget on the Time Tracking overview screen, and then input the number of hours and minutes you spent on the work into the input box, overwriting the 0:00. Finally, select the ‘Create timeslip’ button that automatically appears when you enter any time into the input box.

You can also create daily timeslips from the Overview area by selecting ‘New timeslip’ from the ‘Quick links’ drop-down menu.

You also have the option to create daily timeslips from the Projects area of FreeAgent. If the status of your project is not ‘Active’, you will need to use this method to create timeslips for it, as only active projects appear in the time tracking view. Simply choose ‘Projects’ from the ‘Work’ drop-down menu, and select the project that the timeslip relates to. You will then be directed to the project summary page. From there, navigate to ‘Add new’ and select ‘Timeslip’ from the drop-down menu.

Complete the ‘Project’, ‘User’, ‘Dated on’ and ‘Task’ fields (you will have the option to create a new task if there isn’t an appropriate one on the list). Select either ‘Start timer’ to use the stopwatch function, or ‘Start and add another’ to use the stopwatch function and create another timeslip. Alternatively, you can enter the time manually in the ‘Hours’ field.

Create a weekly timesheet

If you prefer, you can record a whole week’s worth of time retrospectively. To do this, simply choose ‘Add weekly timesheet’ from the Time Tracking overview screen.

Select the appropriate project, user and working week from the drop-down menus. You can create a new weekly timesheet for the current week and past weeks, but not for weeks in the future. Manually enter the hours and minutes that were spent on the task each day that week, and select ‘Create timesheet’.

Reviewing tracked time

Whichever method you use to track your time, all the timeslips you create will be visible in the list of timeslips that appears beneath the ‘Add new timeslip’ widget on the Time Tracking overview screen. There are a number of options for viewing your timeslips: as a chronological list, as a weekly view, and as a view of a single day. You can control the date that these views are based on using the calendar picker next to the view options.

You can then filter your view of the timeslips further, using the drop-down ‘Show’ menu. Filter by ‘Invoiced’, ‘Unbilled’, ‘Unbillable’ or ‘Running’ timeslips.